Just writing the name “Uwe Krupp” brought back a little tingle to my fingers.
It’s probably been about three years since I have done that, and that’s far too long. Uwe Krupp will be back in Denver Monday night for “Uwe Krupp Night” at the Pepsi Center, and even though I have Monday off, I can’t miss Uwe Krupp Night. So I’m going to go, maybe just sit in the stands and watch the game with the rest of you. Screw the press box. The view is the worst in the building anyway.

Lots of old memories when Krupp’s name comes up, none bigger, of course, than the goal he scored to win the 1996 Stanley Cup. It’s a night I can never forget, naturally, not the least of which because I still have a t-shirt with the front page of the next day’s Denver Post reproduced on it. Ever see a t-shirt with a story you wrote on it? It’s a weird thing, believe me.

Some quick snapshots from that night in Miami:
– It was unbelievably hot in the building, probably 80 degrees or so. The air conditioning in the old Miami Arena was basically non-existent. It was a sweatbox.
– Craig Stadler hugging Patrick Roy after the game, saying “You @$#$$@ brick wall.”
– When Krupp scored, it was about 1 a.m. eastern time, 11 mountain. Back in those days, we used Radio Shack TRS-80 computers, which had enough memory to hold – and I’m not kidding here – about three or four normal-length newspaper stories. After that, you had to delete a story just to make room for a new one.

That meant I had about an hour, tops, to run down a long concourse down in the arena bowels, start interviewing a packed, sweaty, loud, champagne-soaked locker room and also get more quotes from the official NHL podium rostrum of Avs players, run all the way back and start writing an entire new “Denver has its first pro championship team ever” story”, not to mention another side story and some “candy” as they call it – basically things like picking the three stars and other little nuggets. It’s to my everlasting shame that, in my harried, rushed, completely chaotic state of mind that I picked Krupp as the game’s No. 1 star in the paper. Not that getting a goal to win the Stanley Cup isn’t worthy of that perhaps, but NOT ON A NIGHT WHEN PATRICK ROY MADE 63 SAVES IN A 1-0, TRIPLE-OVERTIME SHUTOUT.

I blew that one, all right. Roy should have been No. 1 star. But it will forever show on that t-shirt, Krupp as the No. 1.

– With our flight back to Denver slated for 6 a.m., I didn’t get a wink of sleep that night. All I vaguely remember after the game was utter silence outside Miami Arena. I mean, not a single person or sound anywhere around the perimeter of the building, only a couple hours probably after the final horn sounded. I also remember a massive bowl of shrimp back at the hotel, as part of the NHL’s official afterparty. There may or may not have been some alcohol consumed too.

Krupp was one of my favorite players to cover, because he was very intelligent and liked to talk about other things besides hockey. He was a big music buff (Bush was a favorite band) and he was a guy who lived in Evergreen, in a big house who drove a Hummer back and forth to games. He also loved to race sled dogs (which got him in some trouble with his next team, the Detroit Red Wings). Krupp had a deep cynical streak, too, which only endeared him more to me. He was one of those guys who didn’t just swallow the company line, who questioned authority at times and wasn’t afraid to let his opinion be heard. Ironically, he’s a coach now, for the German national team. I hope the fans give Uwe a huge hand tonight. I’m sure, if the Avs have a lick of sense, that they’ll show the goal that won the Cup in ’96, which would automatically get a big hand. But he was one of the original Avs, and that whole team will always have a special place in anybody’s heart who cared about that team.

Terry Frei graduated from Wheat Ridge High School in the Denver area and has degrees in history and journalism from the University of Colorado-Boulder. He worked for the Rocky Mountain News while attending CU and joined the Post staff after graduation. He has also worked at the Oregonian in Portland, Ore., and The Sporting News. His seventh book, March 1939: Before the Madness, was issued in February 2014.

Chambers covers college and professional hockey for The Denver Post. He has written for the Post since 1994, after dumping his first 9-to-5 office job a couple years out of college. He primarily follows the University of Denver hockey team and helps cover the Avalanche.